Mobile devices are small electronic computing devices often referred to as personal digital assistants. Many of such mobile devices are hand-held devices, or palm-sized devices which comfortably fit within the hand. One commercially available mobile device is sold under the trade name Handheld PC (or H/PC) having software provided by Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, Wash.
Mobile devices can perform a wide variety of computing tasks and execute a wide variety of applications. Personal information managers (PIMs) are particularly well suited to mobile devices.
PIMs typically comprise applications which enable the user of the mobile device to better manage scheduling and communication, and other such tasks. Some commonly available PIMs include scheduling and calendar programs and are included in the commercially available under the brand names Microsoft Schedule+and Microsoft Outlook, both of which are provided by Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, Wash.
The small physical size of such mobile devices can present significant obstacles in attempting to implement such PIMs. For example, conveying information through the electronic display can be difficult under certain circumstances. Many users of PIMs, when viewing a schedule, wish to have more than one day viewable at once. In fact, some users may wish to have an entire month, several months, or an entire year, viewable at once. However, the electronic display in such mobile devices is typically much smaller than that found on a conventional desktop computer. For example, mobile devices may have a display formatted as a grid having a size of only 240.times.320 pixels. Some such mobile devices, in fact, have a display which is as small as 160.times.160 pixels. This is much smaller than a conventional desktop computer screen. Consequently, the resolution can be much lower as well. In small screen devices, it becomes more difficult to show useful information at a single glance. For instance, it is typically not difficult to provide a calendar view showing the events of a single day since the entire screen can be used to display that day's events. However, if multiple days are to be shown at once, the space available to display each day's events in a meaningful way is considerably limited. The problem becomes even more significant when trying to show, for instance, events for an entire month at a glance.
Several attempts have been made to provide a view of multiple days (such as a month view) and still give an indication as to the number of appointments or events scheduled for each day in that month. One such prior art mobile device has provided a month view which shows a conventional calendar face, having a square representing each day in the month. Each square has a pair of blocks, one at the top of the square and one at the bottom of the square, which can be shaded. If the user of the mobile device has one or more appointments before noon on any given day, then the top block in the corresponding square is shaded. If the user has one or more appointments or events scheduled in the afternoon of a specific day, then the bottom block in the corresponding square is shaded. If the user has appointments or events scheduled both before and after noon of any given day, then both blocks are shaded. Of course, this type of system does not convey how busy a person is for any given day, nor does it give any indication as to whether certain times in the morning or afternoon are free of appointments or events, unless the entire morning or afternoon is free.
In another prior art device, three blocks are provided. Two of the blocks are similar to those described above, while the third represents a time period from 12:00 noon to 1:00 PM.